Villa Cospatric
Villa Cospatric # DFL S NT1285 3
uilla Cospatric 1230 x 1250 NLS MS Adv. 34.1.3 (a), fo 124r, col. 2 [printed as Dunf. Reg. no. 199, which has Gospatric;there is no doubt that the initial letter is C not G; (‘in the land which was once called Gospatrick’s vill, which is now called *Cauldstanes’ (in terra que quondam appellabatur uilla Cospatric, que nunc appellatur Kaldestanis)]
Latin ‘vill or estate of Gospatrick’. This probably translates a vernacular *Gospatricston. This place-name occurs only once, when John Crassus (‘the Fat’) son of Richard Crassus quitclaims all rights in this land to the abbot and convent of Dunfermline, his feudal superiors, in return for other land including three acres of bog in the north part of Garvock (east of Dunfermline), a certain sum of money ‘paid to me in advance in my very great necessity’ (in mea maxima necessitate pre manibus perpacata), and an annual grant of one chalder of oat meal from the abbey’s granger to Richard’s wife Isabella for the rest of her life (Dunf. Reg. no. 199).
Villa Cospatric was certainly near Dunfermline, possibly between that burgh and the burgh of Inverkeithing. In the first half of the thirteenth century Richard Crassus son of Richard Crassus, the former presumably John’s father, quitclaims to Dunfermline Abbey his land of Ardlather # or *Milton DFL, which was adjacent to Mastertown DFL near Inverkeithing (Dunf. Reg. no. 198).
There is only one Gospatrick who appears in the historical record associated with the Dunfermline area. Waldeve son of Gospatrick was lord of Inverkeithing, as well as of Dalmeny WLO, in the later twelfth century (see Dunf. Reg. no. 165 and also Inchcolm Chrs. no. 7 and notes). It is likely that Gospatrick, his father, held these lands before him, as Gospatrick had some controlling interest in the ferries at Queensferry in the mid-twelfth century (RRS i no. 126). For more discussion of the identity of this Gospatrick, see under Cockairnie DGY. And for more on the name Gospatric(k), see Edmonds 2009.
However, when explicit evidence is lacking, the linking of a personal name as a specific in a place-name with an historical personage is fraught with problems. This is well illustrated in the place-name *Beath-Waldeve BEA, DFL. Given the importance of Waldeve son of Gospatrick as a land-holder in and around Inverkeithing in the later twelfth century, it might not seem too rash to conclude that this is the Waldeve of Beath-Waldeve. However, there happens to be documentary evidence which shows that the Waldeve of Beath-Waldeve was Waldeve of Strachan KCD, fl. 1200 (see Beath-Waldeve BEA, DFL for details). Gospatrick was also a common name in southern Scotland and northern England in the eleventh and twelfth century.
Kaldestanis is Sc cauld stanes ‘cold stones’. Also obsolete, this would seem to be its only occurrence in the records.
This place-name appeared in printed volume 1